colour laser printers

[scruffy]

anyone got any experience with colour lasers, brands and models etc, looking for something capable of producing small run good quality graphics/text business docs.

thanks in advance

s

 

[jimmy]

We have a HP 4500 Color Laserjet printer, it is a few years old but very good quality output.

It can be fussy with paper but we just avoid the cheap stuff particularly when printing double sided. Beware of the cheap pinters, the consumables can be very expensive.

 

[A-AvantGarde]

At work we've used ealry Epson AccuLasers and found them to be terrible. We then switched to HP ColorLaserJet 2500's & 2550's. They're pretty good & really cheap (to purchase anyway!), although they're not very fast (compared to a B&W laser). Most colour lasers have this problem because they have a rotating drum.

If you want something fast and reliable try looking at the Xerox Phaser 8400. Strictly speaking it's not a laser but uses solid wax cartridges but it's very very fast and the print outs have a nice waxy look to them, great for logo letterheads & even photos etc. The only disadvantage I can think of is that they need to be left powered on all the time as the printer head has to warm up. The cold start time is in excess of 15 minutes! Can't recommend them enough (by the way I have no affiliation with HP or Xerox!). I just use the things!

 

[drifting]

Take a good look at the running costs, the consumables are really expensive for colour lasers.
We sell HP and Kyocera, one customer changed from HP to Kyocera and saved over 3K in one year on consumables (Estate Agent) Quality is excellent as well.

Regards Paul.

 

[fuzzer]

there is a printer on pcworld for £150 , full colour laser .. check out the replacement toner kit £ 199

colour laser costs the earth. don't underspec as it will cost you more in the long run.

 

[Shude]

IMHO the person to speak to regarding printers is someone in the returns department at a shop that sells printers! Ask them which ones rarely get returned and it might help your decision!

I used to work for a company that let the sales dept choose their own printers and they ended up with some Sharp rubbish of which about 3 broke (out of 5) within a month or so! Spec was good though...

 

[guydewdney]

my ancient xerox (docuprint 4517) still works fine - apart fromt he pick up from the add-on full ream tray at the bottom - sometimes picks up two / 3 sheets.

never been cleaned, no maintainance, works perfectly.

bought for 50 quid.

ok - so its b&w - but it shows the quality of the things...


what about a b&w laser for 99% of docs, and a bubble / injet for the few colour things u do? or do u do loads of colour stuff?

 

[Shude]

my ancient xerox (docuprint 4517) still works fine - apart fromt he pick up from the add-on full ream tray at the bottom - sometimes picks up two / 3 sheets.

never been cleaned, no maintainance, works perfectly.

bought for 50 quid.

ok - so its b&w - but it shows the quality of the things...

I got a Kyocera b&w laser printer for FREE from ICI a few years ago when they changed their IT contract to Compaq and had to bin anything non-compaq or HP.

Never been cleaned, no maintenance, never bought a toner cartridge for it yet (in maybe 6-7 years!) and I prolly print only a page or two each week, but the quality is excellent. According to the counter on the side it's 44987 pages so far...

Only fault with it is that when the paper tray gets a bit low it struggles to pick up a page, however I have discovered that this may simply be down to cheap paper!

 

[JFleming]

We've got a couple of HP Color laserjets at work. We had a Minolta and it was great but unreliable and the toner was £150 A COLOUR! We now run HP 4650 and an 5500.. The 4650 is cheaper, faster and uses a single pass for the toner transfer so can take card... Consumables are HP priced but generics are available for the brave of warranty!

 

[drifting]

IMHO the person to speak to regarding printers is someone in the returns department at a shop that sells printers! Ask them which ones rarely get returned and it might help your decision!

KYOCERA !!

Regards Paul.

 

[A-AvantGarde]

KYOCERA !!

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaargh! I've had my fingers burnt with Kyocera in the past with massive consumables costs & even more maintenace hassles. However these printers I got involved in supporting were about 8-11 years old!

Although these were B&W we replaced all of them with HP LaserJets and they've been fantastic. There's an IT quote that goes... 'no one ever got fired for buying HP' (substitute for IBM, Cisco or Micro$oft... as applicable!)

 

[scruffy]

what about a b&w laser for 99% of docs, and a bubble / injet for the few colour things u do? or do u do loads of colour stuff?

all our pc's are stand alones with b&w samsung laser printers which were about £100 each, there about £50 now, they have been flawless, cheap to run and thoroughly reccomended, however, we spend quite a lot outsourcing our printing for both long and short run work so figured (seeing as colour lasers have dramatically reduced lately) maybe we should keep the short run stuff in house. The frustrating thing with IT stuff is that no matter reports you read or how much research you do, the item you buy never quite perfoms as well as you'd hoped. Been bitten at home with an epson all in one, rubbish.

I basically need a printer that will produce high quality graphical tech specs/product details including full page graphics etc at least 10-16ppm without spending an arm and a leg.

am currently looking at the phaser 8400b and the oki 5400n, thanks a-avantgarde for the lead. Interestingly, none of the major manufacturers offer to send test page samples, how odd, wouldn't buy a car without a test would you. Any more input greatly appreciated.

thanks s

 

[A-AvantGarde]

I basically need a printer that will produce high quality graphical tech specs/product details including full page graphics etc at least 10-16ppm without spending an arm and a leg.

am currently looking at the phaser 8400b and the oki 5400n, thanks a-avantgarde for the lead. buy a car without a test would you. Any more input greatly appreciated.

thanks s

If you like you could send some sample files and I can run off some test prints if that helps.

Naj

 

[ssomal]

Xerox Phaser 6100

http://www.printerbase.co.uk/acatalog/xerox-6100.html

I have installed about 10 of these decent bit of kit, there a network versiond for around £50 extra.

 

[scruffy]

If you like you could send some sample files and I can run off some test prints if that helps.

Naj

thanks for the offer, found an independant who offers test pages so requested some on line

cheers anyway

 

[A-AvantGarde]

thanks for the offer, found an independant who offers test pages so requested some on line

cheers anyway

No worries, let us know what you choose & how you get on!